But among other reforms is surely the item that banks shouldn't go down* (i.e. collapse) when the economy they work in goes down* (i.e. lower economic activity, slowdown, recession etc.) ?
It is being discussed in neighbouring threads here, that traditional money-lending banks are now dabbling in stocks, futures, options and 10th degree derivatives of those items. There is no more the firewall between the money-lending and these "innovative" activities. If a firewall is ensured, and banks regulated to take less risks, I don't see why a slow economy would mean a dead bank. The bank should get lower profits, a bit higher non-performing-assets, but if initial risks weren't too high bank shouldn't die.
* The different meanings of "down" is what I am deducing from your statement, and it is important for the point I am making. This is because regions don't typically die and low profits/occasional losses of banks isn't typically catastrophic.
While I am not a fan of WhatsApp, this is a huge understatement of the merits :
1. Photo / audio / video sharing - lots of people prefer WhatsApp to even facebook for this. Especially for small photos that are clicked/sent/viewed on phone
2. Their owners displayed a hate of advertisements, of analyzing user's content and even storing user's content for long. To this end they charge a dollar after a year of free usage, and, biggest achievement, many people paid. That is huge - especially for facebook which is an utter failure without peeking into user's content.
While I agree the agitation has blown the issue out of proportion, software lifecycle?
Do you know what beta means? Full features, probably significant bugs, useful but not necessarily stable. The slashdot beta does not satisfy those criteria. The lack of features make it an early alpha.
But most applications you install on your computer/phone/server could abuse their powers. If not right now, maybe in future when you install "security" updates, since corporations change.
If raising the minimum wage makes a business not start up, then it wasn't viable because it couldn't pay the actual cost of it's labor without getting the public to pay it's payroll for it.
Depends on 1. what the minimum wage already is 2. what profit business in general is making 3. how much is minimum wage is being raised
If (1) is high enough with normal (2) and (3)
OR (2) is low enough with normal (1) and (3)
OR (3) is high enough with normal (1) and (2), this statement of yours is false. There are many other combinations in which this statement of yours is false.
Then you give warnings of possible pitfalls for raising minimum wage
You haven't argued against the pitfalls at all. Pitfalls are definitely worse for everyone. I don't see what business you have to repeatedly ask me for the same argument.
So do you support basic income, yes or no?
Yes
Do you support raising the minimum wage, yes or no?
Depends. Seems a very stupid question though - if the answer to this is "yes", without any "depends" that is a support for infinite minimum wage.
Do you support let the employees starve, yes or no
No
Do you support continuing to pay businesses bills for them, yes or no
No
If you answered no to all of the above, what specifically do you suggest instead?
If you think so simplistically as expect a yes or no answer to "raise the minimum wages?" question, I suggest nothing to you except point out to you that it directly implies supporting infinite minimum wage.
Specifically for Walmart? Maybe. Generally? Not without cutting your nose to spite your face.
This could cause Walmart to automate more. Some businesses could start outsourcing more to other states / countries. New labour intensive businesses don't start up. Which is why correct minimum wage could be very low at times - and this could be good for the workers if you put on myopia curing glasses for a moment.
Yes, more non-viable businesses should not start up. If you think it contradicts me in any way, you are mistaken.
Problem cannot be solved. Freer market reduces outrageous imbalances.
I pointed out that labor could never be a free market and you appear to agree.
Yes, it is like saying one can never buy exactly one kilogram of apples, accurate to picograms. I agree. Vendors cheat - more or less. An attempt to ensure they don't cheat is necessary. But the amount they sell for the price of 1 kg can be, and is brought sufficiently close for the difference to not matter. Where more cheating exists, more attention is required.
There is one more similarity - an insistence to sell exact mass accurate to picograms will increase the price or ruin the business. Similarly an insistence to keep the labour market "FREE" can decrease wages by increasing compliance costs or ruin business.
I further pointed out that very few if any markets seem to be sufficiently free to work as a free market is claimed to work.
In my country, for all its faults, there are a lot of markets where all stakeholders seem happy enough. That is sufficiently free for me. Some are not, we are working to change that. What is so difficult to understand about that? Purists can find faults with any market, with zero relevance.
But they do. They pay their employees too little knowing that food stamps will make up the difference because society considers just letting people starve to be unacceptable
Good for you - something you can work to change. I never claimed everything is perfect.
If they only paid half of their power bill would you be OK with paying the other half for them?
I already said other people paying for them is not OK. How does this statement help?
The other solution is to mandate that they pay enough that the workers don't need or qualify for food stamps.
Specifically for Walmart? Maybe. Generally? Not without cutting your nose to spite your face.
This could cause Walmart to automate more. Some businesses could start outsourcing more to other states / countries. New labour intensive businesses don't start up. Which is why correct minimum wage could be very low at times - and this could be good for the workers if you put on myopia curing glasses for a moment.
Yeah, and due to the bad economy, the Walton family is barely squeaking by with a mere 46% of the entire wealth of the U.S.
I didn't say economy is so bad currently, nor that it needs to be bad in all industries together, nor for all businesses in an industry together.
There is no such thing as a free market when one party has no ability to exit
Yes, perfect free market is difficult to achieve. In some markets, e.g. wage/labour market as I said, it is good to get closer to free market. You haven't made an argument to the contrary, so I'm not sure why you made this statement.
However it would be unconscionable to start killing people when demand for labor falls.
Exactly. Which is why any approach which can even indirectly lead to business shrinking is a crime. One of those is tightening labour laws too much like what happens at times in my country.
Consider what happens if you remove the social safety net entirely (wouldn't want some poor slob to spend other people's money!) and minimum wage
Yes, so don't remove social safety net entirely, nor minimum wage. Like I said : "But the reason for minimum wages should not just be to make life comfortable for employees". I didn't say "Minimum wages should be abolished".
Minimum wages and social security net has other advantages than to be kind to people. E.g. a lot of wealth in a country is created by businessmen who took risks. A country that encourages businessmen to take calculated risks is likely to prosper. Risk means high/medium chances of failure. By supporting failed businessmen and not rewarding them more than successful ones; a country encourages calculated risk taking.
Working for salary is also somewhat like a business here - taking calculated risks helps the country as well as the career of oneself. They might not work always - so social security and correct minimum wage.
Correct minimum wage is not infinity, nor is 25 cents an hour always guaranteed to be incorrect minimum wage like I explained in my post.
How long are those employees that don't make enough money to afford food, clothing, and shelter going to be around?
Which is why it is in Walmart's interest to give them enough money.
How will you like having a smelly naked and starving greeter at Walmart?
Not much. You are piling up reasons for Walmart to pay enough to their workers. I don't see a problem.
Put in language you might understand, why should Walmart get to spend other people's money keeping their employees fed?
It certainly can be if you also have a social safety net
Until you run out of other people's money ?
Otherwise, why not pay $0.25 an hour?
Distortions in "free" market can take place in either direction - too much of union or too much of employer collusion both are likely enough. In this regard, the closer we move to a "free" market, the better it is.
But the reason for minimum wages should not just be to make life comfortable for employees. Sometimes with a genuine rotten economy wages can go very low in spite of no employer collusion - e.g. there are very low profits to be made. In these circumstances if wages are forced to be high, companies are shut down and employees lose the 25 cents an hour that they are getting. Or, worse, automation/oursourcing make jobs unavailable in the next boom cycle too.
Safety net has to be from taxes - of which there are very few because of the low economic activity. You could print money - but most economies either get foreign investments or imports, both of which are badly affected by printing money.
Very low wages, if for honest reasons, have a back handed 'benefit" too. Essentials become cheaper, though it won't be the "rich" goods people are used to in the developed world. This is, to take a food example, because in better times, more opulent foods are produced more, giving them economy of scale. Hence the foods that can be produced very very cheaply if there were enough market for it, is either not produced or aren't available widely. Even foods that can promote reasonably good health.
I think I understand what you are saying. But my country goes the other extreme. Businesses are scared to employ because of labour laws.
Labour "protection" laws have the labour reducing side-effect - through automation, overwork, outsourcing, so-called contract workers, etc. This cannot be better than low wages?
8 year old PCs also solve some of today's problems. (Today's PCs also don't solve all of today's problems). In fact you are actively discouraging people from solving today's problems using 8 year old hardware here. If everyone takes your advice, yes 8 year old PCs cannot solve today's problems. That doesn't mean the advice is any good, or many will take it, or the 8 year old PC is in any way incapable of solving some of today's problems.
The biggest new problem we have is decreasing levels of user knowledge about PC paradigms, decreasing computer literacy
There are bigger problems. AIDS, obesity, fresh water crisis, TSA, Al-Quaida and many more.
That requires the move to newer hardware that is more like smartphones in terms of interface, where the end users are becoming increasing literate
Fewer people (in proportion) today know how to use a hammer. Surely the hammer interface needs to be updated to be more like Facebook's interface, where the end users are becoming increasing literate.
Another example of that is breaking file management that was designed around dual floppies and moving, which requires SSD as being effectively mandatory
Not clear what you are trying to say. People didn't move much when using dual floppy computers - in fact some have argued that computers, starting with such computers, started the obesity epidemic by making people move less. I haven't deliberately moved files on my data storage devices for a long time, and my mom has never moved any files in her life. Some operating systems do keep trying to create and destroy small files at multiple hertz, but that is not called moving. Data does get copied around a lot in various level caches, but calling it "moving" is grossly stupid.
As for SSDs, they were "needed" 8 years ago too. They just weren't available, or the kind that were available were too expensive. That "need" hasn't increased in proportion to computer usage, only availability has increased.
Another example is bringing down size and weight which definitely requires hardware and some level of software support
Mostly size of existing hardware is not being "brought down", new hardware is created that can do more at smaller size. Existing hardware keeps working, keeps solving problems that existed 8 years ago as well as those that exist today. 8 year old PC cannot directly grow my food, today's fastest supercomputer cannot do so either. Both, with appropriate human and internet interface can let me check my mail - a need that existed 8 years ago as well as it exists today.
So you want to solve today's problems you don't target six year ago's hardware
If you used to eat, drink or breathe 6 years ago, you don't do so today because they are 6 year old problems. I'm running on over 40 year old hardware.
Yes. To be specific : 1. Hardware technology has become better. 2. Hardware is not useful in itself, but creates solutions because of software that runs on it. This combination could be useful in itself. 3. Targeting 6 year old hardware for latest software solves more problems than targeting only 6 months old hardware. 4. It might discourage hardware development, that's ok because hardware is not useful in itself. Someone working in technology should focus on solving more problems rather than encourage hardware for its own sake. It IS a dichotomy.
Whatever. But same limitations of 2-3 decades ago would be a dismal failure today - and from today's point of view that time period is a dismal failure.
While beta is unusable for me, I don't think it cannot be salvaged. Do you still have any problem if :
1. "Parent" link for posts is back (real HTML link, possible to be opened in a new tab)
2. Information (UID, direct HTML link to current post) is back.
3. "Reply" becomes a real HTML link, possible to be opened in a new tab
4. Never commented using beta, but say the comment drafting/ previewing / submitting is similar to how it is now.
None of these break the beta fundamentally. Beta has been around for a long time and still doesn't open by default for users with appropriate settings - this seems to be a good sign. I have not lost hope - why have you?
Editorship at slashdot, jokes aside, is a full-time job
I think this is not necessary. You could give mod points to many more people (than Slashdot currently gives). Then the need for modding by the editors / owners themselves will be highly diminished.
Same person shouldn't get too many mod points, but more people should have mod points at any given time.
I've never managed to vote for a winning president
That is very interesting. May I ask - were you in a swing state?
I feel some of what Americans need is people to vote for new parties, especially in non-swing states. Most seats being de-facto of a particular party makes US Presidents not care about voters in most states. They need more people to vote like you did.
Slashdot Mirror
I said sharing, not one-to-one messaging.
But among other reforms is surely the item that banks shouldn't go down* (i.e. collapse) when the economy they work in goes down* (i.e. lower economic activity, slowdown, recession etc.) ?
It is being discussed in neighbouring threads here, that traditional money-lending banks are now dabbling in stocks, futures, options and 10th degree derivatives of those items. There is no more the firewall between the money-lending and
these "innovative" activities. If a firewall is ensured, and banks regulated to take less risks, I don't see why a slow economy would mean a dead bank. The bank should get lower profits, a bit higher non-performing-assets, but if initial risks weren't too high bank shouldn't die.
* The different meanings of "down" is what I am deducing from your statement, and it is important for the point I am making. This is because regions don't typically die and low profits/occasional losses of banks isn't typically catastrophic.
While I am not a fan of WhatsApp, this is a huge understatement of the merits :
1. Photo / audio / video sharing - lots of people prefer WhatsApp to even facebook for this. Especially for small photos that are clicked/sent/viewed on phone
2. Their owners displayed a hate of advertisements, of analyzing user's content and even storing user's content for long. To this end they charge a dollar after a year of free usage, and, biggest achievement, many people paid. That is huge - especially for facebook which is an utter failure without peeking into user's content.
While I agree the agitation has blown the issue out of proportion, software lifecycle?
Do you know what beta means? Full features, probably significant bugs, useful but not necessarily stable. The slashdot beta does not satisfy those criteria. The lack of features make it an early alpha.
But most applications you install on your computer/phone/server could abuse their powers. If not right now, maybe in future when you install "security" updates, since corporations change.
I don't see you complaining this about emacs.
IT ---about to hit enter twice ---
--hit enter twice above, about to hit enter twice more --
DOES
Just use plain old text, it even
No you've not been clear.
Reasonably could mean that but I don't see the purpose of explaining meanings of random words. I didn't see this word in your previous post.
If raising the minimum wage makes a business not start up, then it wasn't viable because it couldn't pay the actual cost of it's labor without getting the public to pay it's payroll for it.
Depends on
1. what the minimum wage already is
2. what profit business in general is making
3. how much is minimum wage is being raised
If (1) is high enough with normal (2) and (3)
OR (2) is low enough with normal (1) and (3)
OR (3) is high enough with normal (1) and (2), this statement of yours is false. There are many other combinations in which this statement of yours is false.
Then you give warnings of possible pitfalls for raising minimum wage
You haven't argued against the pitfalls at all. Pitfalls are definitely worse for everyone. I don't see what business you have to repeatedly ask me for the same argument.
So do you support basic income, yes or no?
Yes
Do you support raising the minimum wage, yes or no?
Depends. Seems a very stupid question though - if the answer to this is "yes", without any "depends" that is a support for infinite minimum wage.
Do you support let the employees starve, yes or no
No
Do you support continuing to pay businesses bills for them, yes or no
No
If you answered no to all of the above, what specifically do you suggest instead?
If you think so simplistically as expect a yes or no answer to "raise the minimum wages?" question, I suggest nothing to you except point out to you that it directly implies supporting infinite minimum wage.
It is already phrased very well.
Specifically for Walmart? Maybe. Generally? Not without cutting your nose to spite your face.
This could cause Walmart to automate more. Some businesses could start outsourcing more to other states / countries. New labour intensive businesses don't start up. Which is why correct minimum wage could be very low at times - and this could be good for the workers if you put on myopia curing glasses for a moment.
Yes, more non-viable businesses should not start up. If you think it contradicts me in any way, you are mistaken.
No, try reading my post again.
Not sure of Reagan, but if you keep misinterpreting answers you can think so of anyone.
No. Read it again, maybe?
I guess you didn't reach the last paragraph of my post.
You said a free market would solve the problem
Problem cannot be solved. Freer market reduces outrageous imbalances.
I pointed out that labor could never be a free market and you appear to agree.
Yes, it is like saying one can never buy exactly one kilogram of apples, accurate to picograms. I agree. Vendors cheat - more or less. An attempt to ensure they don't cheat is necessary. But the amount they sell for the price of 1 kg can be, and is brought sufficiently close for the difference to not matter. Where more cheating exists, more attention is required.
There is one more similarity - an insistence to sell exact mass accurate to picograms will increase the price or ruin the business. Similarly an insistence to keep the labour market "FREE" can decrease wages by increasing compliance costs or ruin business.
I further pointed out that very few if any markets seem to be sufficiently free to work as a free market is claimed to work.
In my country, for all its faults, there are a lot of markets where all stakeholders seem happy enough. That is sufficiently free for me. Some are not, we are working to change that. What is so difficult to understand about that? Purists can find faults with any market, with zero relevance.
But they do. They pay their employees too little knowing that food stamps will make up the difference because society considers just letting people starve to be unacceptable
Good for you - something you can work to change. I never claimed everything is perfect.
If they only paid half of their power bill would you be OK with paying the other half for them?
I already said other people paying for them is not OK. How does this statement help?
The other solution is to mandate that they pay enough that the workers don't need or qualify for food stamps.
Specifically for Walmart? Maybe. Generally? Not without cutting your nose to spite your face.
This could cause Walmart to automate more. Some businesses could start outsourcing more to other states / countries. New labour intensive businesses don't start up. Which is why correct minimum wage could be very low at times - and this could be good for the workers if you put on myopia curing glasses for a moment.
Yeah, and due to the bad economy, the Walton family is barely squeaking by with a mere 46% of the entire wealth of the U.S.
I didn't say economy is so bad currently, nor that it needs to be bad in all industries together, nor for all businesses in an industry together.
There is no such thing as a free market when one party has no ability to exit
Yes, perfect free market is difficult to achieve. In some markets, e.g. wage/labour market as I said, it is good to get closer to free market. You haven't made an argument to the contrary, so I'm not sure why you made this statement.
However it would be unconscionable to start killing people when demand for labor falls.
Exactly. Which is why any approach which can even indirectly lead to business shrinking is a crime. One of those is tightening labour laws too much like what happens at times in my country.
Consider what happens if you remove the social safety net entirely (wouldn't want some poor slob to spend other people's money!) and minimum wage
Yes, so don't remove social safety net entirely, nor minimum wage. Like I said : "But the reason for minimum wages should not just be to make life comfortable for employees". I didn't say "Minimum wages should be abolished".
Minimum wages and social security net has other advantages than to be kind to people. E.g. a lot of wealth in a country is created by businessmen who took risks. A country that encourages businessmen to take calculated risks is likely to prosper. Risk means high/medium chances of failure. By supporting failed businessmen and not rewarding them more than successful ones; a country encourages calculated risk taking.
Working for salary is also somewhat like a business here - taking calculated risks helps the country as well as the career of oneself. They might not work always - so social security and correct minimum wage.
Correct minimum wage is not infinity, nor is 25 cents an hour always guaranteed to be incorrect minimum wage like I explained in my post.
How long are those employees that don't make enough money to afford food, clothing, and shelter going to be around?
Which is why it is in Walmart's interest to give them enough money.
How will you like having a smelly naked and starving greeter at Walmart?
Not much. You are piling up reasons for Walmart to pay enough to their workers. I don't see a problem.
Put in language you might understand, why should Walmart get to spend other people's money keeping their employees fed?
They shouldn't get to spend other people's money.
It certainly can be if you also have a social safety net
Until you run out of other people's money ?
Otherwise, why not pay $0.25 an hour?
Distortions in "free" market can take place in either direction - too much of union or too much of employer collusion both are likely enough. In this regard, the closer we move to a "free" market, the better it is.
But the reason for minimum wages should not just be to make life comfortable for employees. Sometimes with a genuine rotten economy wages can go very low in spite of no employer collusion - e.g. there are very low profits to be made. In these circumstances if wages are forced to be high, companies are shut down and employees lose the 25 cents an hour that they are getting. Or, worse, automation/oursourcing make jobs unavailable in the next boom cycle too.
Safety net has to be from taxes - of which there are very few because of the low economic activity. You could print money - but most economies either get foreign investments or imports, both of which are badly affected by printing money.
Very low wages, if for honest reasons, have a back handed 'benefit" too. Essentials become cheaper, though it won't be the "rich" goods people are used to in the developed world. This is, to take a food example, because in better times, more opulent foods are produced more, giving them economy of scale. Hence the foods that can be produced very very cheaply if there were enough market for it, is either not produced or aren't available widely. Even foods that can promote reasonably good health.
I think I understand what you are saying. But my country goes the other extreme. Businesses are scared to employ because of labour laws.
Labour "protection" laws have the labour reducing side-effect - through automation, overwork, outsourcing, so-called contract workers, etc. This cannot be better than low wages?
The exiting hardware solves existing problems
8 year old PCs also solve some of today's problems. (Today's PCs also don't solve all of today's problems). In fact you are actively discouraging people from solving today's problems using 8 year old hardware here. If everyone takes your advice, yes 8 year old PCs cannot solve today's problems. That doesn't mean the advice is any good, or many will take it, or the 8 year old PC is in any way incapable of solving some of today's problems.
The biggest new problem we have is decreasing levels of user knowledge about PC paradigms, decreasing computer literacy
There are bigger problems. AIDS, obesity, fresh water crisis, TSA, Al-Quaida and many more.
That requires the move to newer hardware that is more like smartphones in terms of interface, where the end users are becoming increasing literate
Fewer people (in proportion) today know how to use a hammer. Surely the hammer interface needs to be updated to be more like Facebook's interface, where the end users are becoming increasing literate.
Another example of that is breaking file management that was designed around dual floppies and moving, which requires SSD as being effectively mandatory
Not clear what you are trying to say. People didn't move much when using dual floppy computers - in fact some have argued that computers, starting with such computers, started the obesity epidemic by making people move less. I haven't deliberately moved files on my data storage devices for a long time, and my mom has never moved any files in her life. Some operating systems do keep trying to create and destroy small files at multiple hertz, but that is not called moving. Data does get copied around a lot in various level caches, but calling it "moving" is grossly stupid.
As for SSDs, they were "needed" 8 years ago too. They just weren't available, or the kind that were available were too expensive. That "need" hasn't increased in proportion to computer usage, only availability has increased.
Another example is bringing down size and weight which definitely requires hardware and some level of software support
Mostly size of existing hardware is not being "brought down", new hardware is created that can do more at smaller size. Existing hardware keeps working, keeps solving problems that existed 8 years ago as well as those that exist today. 8 year old PC cannot directly grow my food, today's fastest supercomputer cannot do so either. Both, with appropriate human and internet interface can let me check my mail - a need that existed 8 years ago as well as it exists today.
So you want to solve today's problems you don't target six year ago's hardware
If you used to eat, drink or breathe 6 years ago, you don't do so today because they are 6 year old problems. I'm running on over 40 year old hardware.
Yes. To be specific :
1. Hardware technology has become better.
2. Hardware is not useful in itself, but creates solutions because of software that runs on it. This combination could be useful in itself.
3. Targeting 6 year old hardware for latest software solves more problems than targeting only 6 months old hardware.
4. It might discourage hardware development, that's ok because hardware is not useful in itself. Someone working in technology should focus on solving more problems rather than encourage hardware for its own sake. It IS a dichotomy.
Whatever. But same limitations of 2-3 decades ago would be a dismal failure today - and from today's point of view that time period is a dismal failure.
While beta is unusable for me, I don't think it cannot be salvaged. Do you still have any problem if :
1. "Parent" link for posts is back (real HTML link, possible to be opened in a new tab)
2. Information (UID, direct HTML link to current post) is back.
3. "Reply" becomes a real HTML link, possible to be opened in a new tab
4. Never commented using beta, but say the comment drafting/ previewing / submitting is similar to how it is now.
None of these break the beta fundamentally. Beta has been around for a long time and still doesn't open by default for users with appropriate settings - this seems to be a good sign. I have not lost hope - why have you?
Editorship at slashdot, jokes aside, is a full-time job
I think this is not necessary. You could give mod points to many more people (than Slashdot currently gives). Then the need for modding by the editors / owners themselves will be highly diminished.
Same person shouldn't get too many mod points, but more people should have mod points at any given time.
Yep. DotSlash, like FSM intended it to be.
I've never managed to vote for a winning president
That is very interesting. May I ask - were you in a swing state?
I feel some of what Americans need is people to vote for new parties, especially in non-swing states. Most seats being de-facto of a particular party makes US Presidents not care about voters in most states. They need more people to vote like you did.
He's already sold a lot of it, and soon he will be rid of MS stock. It periodically gets sold and goes to B&MG foundation.
That the supercomputer of 80s costs $100 today and that of 90s costs $1000?